Absence
by Mandy2
Summary: Tristan and Rory share a strange sort of quasifriendship as adults, bonded by their avoidance to fill absences in their lives rather than a deep, humerous connection. Oneshot maybe.


Disclaimer: I don't own Gilmore Girls. I wrote this really quickly. And I don't know where I'm going with it.

Rory didn't state the obvious, but Tristan's apartment was nothing like she thought it would be. It reminded her of her dad's place, after Sherry had left and he'd finally gotten the good sense to hire help. Rory couldn't help but see the similarities. Tristan had a little girl too, Carolina, whose anal-retentive mother had left her with him for greener pastures.

She didn't want to think about the other part, because she was in no place to judge Tristan when her own marriage was in a purgatory as well.

In a large silver frame on the mantle was a photograph of Tristan and Libby, taken ten years ago. Libby was a pop culturally relevant socialite who was famous for being the coed that was engaged to one sexy actor and ended up marrying a musician.

Rory loved the photograph, and even though she'd only met Libby a handful of times, she felt as though whoever had taken it had managed to capture Tristan and Libby at their best. Tristan grasped her wrist in one hand and an umbrella in the other, and her shining dark hair fell over her ivory skin and her vivid purple dress flowed in the wind, catching rain, and they looked like they were about to kiss after a heated argument over something stupid.

"She has two kids, Rory. They're at the same preschool as Caro." Tristan lamented, and he turned the frame around quickly.

Rory noticed that Tristan had been returning to this story quite often in the past week. She patted the swell of her belly and tried to conjure up those instincts that Tristan and Libby put in front of their feelings and she just couldn't do it. As Tristan launched into yet another narrative about the PTA meeting, Rory turned her attention to the window and closed her eyes and tried to imagine what her mother would do.

Tristan knew he'd told the story a thousand times, so he was hardly offended when Rory looked distracted. He swallowed whatever consideration he would normally have taken when the source of her discontent seemed to yet again come from her womb.

Tristan had been elated when his wife Alexandrina had become pregnant, and even Alex had managed to feign similar enthusiasm, although she seemed to try and lock eyes with him during all of their appointments with the obstetrician and dare him to wish Libby had beaten her to it.

Furthermore, from what Tristan was to understand, Rory's relationship with her mother was so close it was borderline unhealthy. When he looked at her and her reaction to her impending motherhood, she looked fearsome, if anything at all.

Rory could feel him swallow and flinch when she let the dark clouds set over her, and she didn't want to talk about it. The last time he'd tried, it'd been almost embarrassing how bad Tristan was at expressing concern. Maybe all those years she'd dismissed him and his attempts at thoughtfulness had finally made an impact.

She chuckled to herself at this point. It was only about seventeen years too late.

"So there she was, in a purple NYU polo, the kind that isn't fitted… and she always looks amazing in purple and I can almost overcome my Ivy League snobbery when she wears it and she apologetically grins about a work load and trying to find her skinny jeans and none of the East Side nannies care, but I care." Tristan rambled. He hung his head like he'd practically rehearsed, and his voice dipped, though the sincerity had long run out on the last part. "She asked, in sheer concern, how I was doing without Alex. I asked how her marriage was going. She told me not to be an asshole."

Rory loved that part, because she had a vaguely perfect picture of Libby's dancing eyes turning serious and of Tristan's own ideas about how to repent.

Like a wind-up radio needing a recharge, Tristan started talking about how beautiful Libby's kids were, despite their musician father being on the unappealing side. Rory disagreed; his cheekbones matched Libby's height for height, and his hair texture and eye color was a perfect complement to Libby's dark locks and almond-shaped twinklers. He rambled on and on about Davis and Whitley until finally he inched towards the window and promised her she'd be a good mother, no matter what.

And Rory didn't know why he said that. Well, she did, but she was still surprised he'd managed to.

She smiled faintly, which she supposed satisfied Tristan, because he'd bolted from her side and turned the frame on the mantle back to its correct position.

"I love that she doesn't employ a nanny, you know? I mean, even though she should since she's a lawyer and Jack's never hands-on with those kids…"

This was the kind of the thing that reminded her why she was friends with Tristan. He tried to care, he really did, and when he did, it made some semblance of an impact on Rory's freezing heart, but his self-absorption was still abundant enough to distract her from the chill.

"We're not in our twenties anymore, you know? She's married, even if it is unhappily… and I can't go running around pretending things are the way they were in law school." Tristan said solemnly, and Rory bit back a laugh, because he made the truth sound like such a profound epiphany.

"I love you, Tris." Rory told him honestly, though the corners of her mouth struggled to hide her laughter.

He rolled his eyes. "Well, aren't we all too late to be making these decisions?"

And Rory knew his implication wasn't directed towards her, but his turn to the melancholy spoiled her temporary happiness.

finis? feedback please


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